Feelin’ It

Michael ArceneauxJanuary 19, 2011

I have never felt more defeated in my life than I did yesterday.

Yesterday, I started my day with a phone call that quickly resulted in me spending two hours of my life crying on the phone with two separate student loan companies. I do not like to cry. Ever. As I broke down over the phone I admitted to myself and out loud that I felt humiliated.

Not only that, I felt less of a man and I honestly haven’t the slightest idea how to move forward. After those phone calls, I honestly just wanted to give up on everything.

And when I say give up, I mean really end it.

I’ve talked about my issues with student loans before — most notably in a piece for The Root. There I admitted my own financial mistakes and how I feel trapped by them.

I have tried really, really hard to be responsible and own up to the mistakes I made taking out private loans to fund my education. This has resulted in me going without so many things.

Going without the dream job offer I actually went to college for. Going without a car for much longer than most people do. Going without any real vacation. Going without working jobs that may reap better long-term benefits because they didn’t produce the short-term benefits I needed them to. Going without many of the things that would make my life happier.

Even despite all of this I’ve tried to remain as positive as I could be. Much of that has to do with me holding on to my dream. The dream that I would ultimately get to do all the things I planned to and one day these stressful times will be over.

And just when I feel like I’m on the path towards that dream, these loans remind me of how much a hindrance they are in me obtaining such a reality.

Sometimes it becomes so unbearable. I talked to my sister yesterday and she was right in pointing out after all of the bullshit we’ve been through, I cannot let this have so much control over me and I shouldn’t be so hard on myself about it.

I can’t help it, though, because I feel like such an idiot and a slave to my own stupid decisions. All I wanted to do was go off to a school that I thought would help me lead a better life and ultimately share that with my family.

I don’t feel close to that at all after yesterday and I’m embarrassed about it.

To make a long story short, another error on my part has resulted in payments that were essentially a car loan soar back to a mortgage size payment the way the lender originally intended. I could swear I told a then customer service rep that I’d like to choose the four-year interest only option over the the two-year one, but it doesn’t matter. Their system says otherwise and they don’t care.

They don’t care that I had to return home after college for a while to figure things out and give them whatever minuscule amount of money I did make at the time. They don’t care that as a result of that I sunk into a deep depression. To the point where I sometimes would drink early in the day while wallowing in self-pity. Then later fighting off what were later explained to me as panic attacks. Panic attacks that would sometimes take place while I was driving. Panic attacks I would later be prescribed an anti-depressant for.

They don’t care immediately after getting off the phone with them this morning I returned to thoughts of killing myself because I just couldn’t entertain thoughts of continued fights anymore.

They don’t care that I’m still crying even as I type this. Nor do they care that despite my shortcomings I have worked relentlessly to be financially responsible.

I’ve spent my entire life trying to be happy despite feeling like everything around me worked against that. It gets so tiring after awhile. They don’t care about that either.

I swear that I’m a good person and I promise you that I work very hard to stay up on every bill. I really think I’m doing my best, and yesterday I was reminded that it wasn’t good enough. Now I feel an even greater distraction from working on what’s necessary to get me where I really want to be because I’m even more bound to do shit that I hate to survive.

Some people might use this against me when I write another post. Do whatever you feel. I’m writing this just as a release. I feel bad that at this point in my life I should be able to take care of my family, not potentially have to ask them to go without to help me. I feel like the biggest sucker for it.

I didn’t want to get up this morning. I didn’t want to even get up yesterday. I had a sneaking suspicion things weren’t going to work out the way I want them to. One reason I wanted to give up completely is due to my fear that no matter how hard I try, it may never work out the way I hope it will. When you have always had such lofty dreams for yourself and no one has ever really told you it can’t happen, there’s a lot of internal pressure there to succeed.

And really, that is all I really want. I genuinely think I can do some amazing things if given the opportunity and I would not be selfish about it. But, the means in which I took in order to be on the path towards that have strangled me. And sometimes, it just seems like it was all for naught and that I’ll forever be ruined by it.

My mom has told me repeatedly in the last two years that she sees great things for me and she knows that they will come, but she shouldn’t be the one to tell me that. I have to have believe it. This is usually followed by her cue for me to go back to church. It’s not that I don’t believe in myself, but maybe over the years I just feel beaten down — clinging to hope but wondering when the better I hope for will come.

And then there are days like yesterday where every fear and every doubt I have internalized but not spoke out about out loud consume me. To the point where I react in a way that scares people. Even myself sometimes.

I know that I have to keep believing, but sometimes things feel so cloudy and I worry. Even more than I usually do.

Here’s to hoping things get better and by hitting ‘publish’ on this post, here’s to hoping I find better means to deal with things when they aren’t.

Edit: I initially regretted putting this up because y’know, I never like to let people see me sweat and some people’s comments can be, uh, unpleasant to read. However, after reading some of the comments here and other places I am glad I left it up. In any event, thank you all for your kind words. No, I am not going to hurt myself. I’ll be fine, but I needed a release. Now before I get to babbling again, let me just end it with thank you. Really. It’s appreciated.